THIS WEEKEND Hollywood's
current princess Natalie Portman reigned supreme over the North American
box office as her new comedy No Strings Attached
debuted at number one giving the Black Swan
actress two films in the top ten a week after her big Golden Globe win.
With no other films opening in wide release, most holdovers fared well
with awards contenders enjoying the best legs thanks to strong word-of-mouth
and buzz. But overall, the marketplace remained in poor shape falling below
last year's levels for the eleventh consecutive weekend.

Audiences came out in healthy numbers for the sex comedy No
Strings Attached spending $19.7M on its opening weekend, according
to final studio figures, with a $6,512
average from 3,018 theaters. The R-rated film starring Portman and Ashton
Kutcher about a couple that tries to have a sex-only relationship played
heavily to young adult women. The debut was slightly better than the openings
for R-rated non-summer comedies like I Love You,
Man ($17.8M) and Forgetting Sarah Marshall
($17.7M) and nearly matched the $20.2M bow of Kutcher's PG-13 summer comedy
What Happens in Vegas co-starring Cameron
Diaz. That film went on to reach $80.3M. Portman has only opened one other
film at number one while in the lead role - V
For Vendetta which bowed to $25.6M in March 2006.

According to studio research, women made up a whopping 70% of the audience
while 60% were over 25. Critics gave mixed reviews and audiences felt the
same as Strings scored a not-so-impressive
B CinemaScore grade. Starpower and a lack of exciting films aimed at young
women right now helped the top spot performance. Produced for just $25M,
the Paramount release may come close to tripling that amount in its final
domestic tally. Female-skewing comedies are often programmed into January
as an alternative option for older teen girls and young women during a
time when the football playoffs are taking lots of men out of the picture.
Sunday's games are expected to have a big impact on the multiplexes, especially
in the Northeast and Midwest where the four Super Bowl-hopeful teams are
from.

Last week's top film The Green Hornet
fell to second and experienced a decent hold for the superhero genre falling
47% to $17.7M. Sony has collected $63M in ten days for its Seth Rogen action
comedy and may find its way to just over the $100M mark domestically. Overseas,
the 3D pic grossed an estimated $18.7M thanks to some new countries opening
upping the international take to $37.4M and the global gross to $100.4M.

Universal suffered a larger-than-hoped-for drop for its Vince Vaughn-Kevin
James buddy comedy The Dilemma which
fell 49% to $9.1M for a ten-day total of $32.7M. Upon opening last weekend
to a soft $17.8M, the studio was comparing the Ron Howard-directed film
to adult comedies like Something's Gotta Give
and As Good As It Gets which had sophomore
declines of 29% and 3% respectively. Budgeted at $70M, The
Dilemma may end its run with $55-60M.

Awards contenders all hoping for Best Picture nominations on Tuesday
from the Academy followed with each showing sturdy legs. The
King's Speech, which surprised the industry Saturday by upsetting
The Social Network for the prestigious
PGA prize, grossed $7.9M. With a slender 15% decline and another frame
in the number four slot, the Colin Firth-Geoffrey Rush period drama pushed
its cume up to $57.3M and might be able to jump the $100M mark if it can
land the wide range of Oscar nods it's expected to get.

The Weinstein Co. reported an aggressive estimate projecting a slim
20% Saturday-to-Sunday drop which ended up being 54%. The royal drama is
following a strategy similar to Million Dollar
Baby by waiting until later in the race to expand nationally
and become a bigger part of the Oscar conversation thus making it a fresher
film to vote for over an overexposed front-runner. The
King's Speech wants to do to The Social
Network what the Clint Eastwood pic did to The
Aviator six years ago.

Western powerhouse True Grit placed
fifth with $7.3M, off only 33%, upping Paramount's take to $138M. Natalie
Portman popped up again with her second film in the top ten with the red
hot Black Swan which took in $5.9M
in its eighth round. Off just 30%, the Fox Searchlight film has banked
$83.3M thus far. Paramount's brother tale The
Fighter, which won both supporting acting Golden Globes last
weekend, dipped a mere 18% to $4.2M and has punched up a solid $72.7M.

The King's Speech and Black
Swan are both on course to join True
Grit in the $100M+ club and Fighter
could break in too proving that quality adult dramas can sell tons of tickets,
especially during awards season. The quartet of acclaimed films has already
grossed a combined $354M and will probably reach $475M or more. The combined
production costs for the four hits is under $100M. Best Picture nominations
will open the doors to more moviegoers curious to see the year's best films
so expect these titles to stick around for a while. And with very few exciting
new releases scheduled between now and Oscar night, there is plenty of
mileage left.

Christmas leftovers rounded out the top ten. Universal's comedy Little
Fockers fell 40% to $4.3M raising the cume to $141.1M. Despite
today's higher ticket prices, the third pic in the series will end as the
lowest-grossing installment finishing below the $166.2M of 2000's Meet
the Parents and well below the $279.2M of 2004's Meet
the Fockers.

Warner Bros. enjoyed another good hold from Yogi
Bear which grossed $3.8M, off 29%, for a $88.6M total. A lack
of competing kidpics is helping the 3D pic head towards $100M. TRON:
Legacy did well too slipping 36% to $3.6M for an impressive
$163.2M to date.

The top ten films grossed $83.4M which was down a troubling 31% from
last year when Avatar stayed in the
top spot with $34.9M; and down 30% from 2009 when Paul
Blart: Mall Cop remained at number one with $21.6M.

Compared to projections, No Strings Attached
was on target with my $19M forecast.

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This column is updated three times each week:
Thursday
(upcoming weekend's summary), Sunday
(post-weekend analysis with estimates), and Monday
night (actuals). Opinions expressed in this column are those solely of
the author.